Images, including photographs, drawings, pictures, graphs, charts, text, logos, symbols, and other visual content, or a combination thereof, can be stored on special film or paper (such as photographic film, or photographic paper), standard office paper, etc. or as digital files on magnetic disks, CD's, DVD's, flash memory, etc. Likewise, audio content, such as sounds, music, and spoken words, can be digitized and stored electronically, for example on CD's, DVD's, flash memory, etc. Similarly, audiovisual content, such as animations, videos, commercials, banner ads, music videos, recorded shows and movies, can also be captured and stored in digital format. For ease of discussion, the term “image” is used herein in many examples and drawings. It is understood that any and all types of visual and/or audio content may be processed or managed in a similar manner.
Today, more and more audio and visual content is stored in the form of digital files. These digital files are then used in computerized displays, performances, or presentations, or are electronically transferred to another medium for display, performance or presentation. When images are used in computerized presentations, for example, the required resolution is limited to the anticipated computer screen resolution. Today, the standard resolution is SVGA (800 pixels×600 pixels). This is a total of 480,000 pixels. In a high-resolution computer system, the resolution might be 1280 pixels by 1024 pixels for a total of 1,310,720 pixels.
By comparison, quality artwork in a magazine or print reproduction would require a resolution of at least 300 dots per inch (DPI). For an 8×10 inch print, this would require 2400 pixels×3000 pixels for a total of 7,200,000 pixels which is almost 7 times that required by a high resolution computer system. Of course larger prints such as 16×20 would require a corresponding increase in total pixels to 28,800,000. Increasing the number of pixels likewise increases the space required to store the image. Also, as the pixels may range from monochrome color, being either black or white (i.e., one bit field), or have a full range of color (i.e., 8-bit, 16-bit or even 32-bit fields), the corresponding image file size likewise increases with increased color depth.
In order to store an image and have it available for all possible uses in the future, the image must be stored in its highest anticipated resolution. Even at 28+ million pixels, this can be accomplished today. The problem is that today, the majority of uses for digital images are for computerized presentations. Although the presentation application could resize the image each time it is used, there are multiple disadvantages to a presentation containing several high-resolution images. One is that to transfer the presentation from one machine to another requires either a lot of bandwidth (e.g., a transfer across the Internet) or a lot of storage space (such as floppy disks, CD's or removable hard drives). For example, a presentation containing only high-resolution images can fill up an entire 650 Mb CD.
Another disadvantage is the excess data manipulation that the computer on which the presentation application is being run on is required to do. Even with today's high speed CPU's, a computer that must repeatedly resize high resolution images to present on a normal resolution computer screen will take several seconds per image before each is to be displayed.
Similar to digital images, the quality and usability of digital audiovisual content, such as animations, video clips, Internet movies and broadcasts, are related to the file format, resolution, compression ratio, or bit rate. For example, audiovisual content stored in the MPEG-1 format is generally regarded as “video quality” while audiovisual content stored in the MPEG-2 format is viewed as “TV” or “DVD” quality. The MPEG-4 provides a high quality, low bandwidth format suitable for Internet transmission.
Likewise, the quality and usability of digitized audio content is related to file format, sampling rate, number of bits used to encode the samples, or compression ratio. For example, the MP3 format maintains higher quality sound at a better compression ratio than other digital audio formats, so that MP3 files require less memory for storage and can use a smaller bandwidth for transmission. Thus, MP3 files are suitable for transmission over the Internet. Other digital audio formats that are currently available include WAV files (used in Microsoft products), MDI (for composing and editing electronic music), AU (used in Unix-based and Java applications) and Audio IFF (used in Apple products). In addition, many of today's music web sites provide both “hi fi” and “lo fi” options for digital audio files, depending on the speed of connection available for transmission.
Given the various quality levels and formats available for audio and/or visual content, it is also desirable to have a system for determining the appropriate quality level and/or format for the digitized content based on the intended use of the content.
In accordance with the present invention, a method is provided for managing graphics files associated with a presentation, the method comprising the steps of storing a first graphics file corresponding to an image in a first graphics resolution in a database, generating a second graphics file in a second graphics resolution from the first graphics file, storing the second graphics file in the database, indexing the second graphics file to the first graphics file, receiving a presentation type for the image, determining an optimum graphics resolution for the image based on the presentation type, and selecting from the first graphics resolution and the a second graphics resolution for use in the presentation based on the optimum graphics resolution.
The above method may further provide that the first graphics file has a first color resolution, the generating step further comprises the step of generating the second graphics file in a second color resolution, and the determining step further comprises the step of determining an optimum color resolution for the image based on the presentation type.
The above method may further provide that the first graphics file has a first graphics file format, the generating step further comprises the step of generating the second graphics file in a second graphics file format, and the determining step further comprises the step of determining an optimum graphics file format for the image based on the presentation type.
The above method may further comprise the step of associating in the database a plurality of graphics resolutions with a plurality of presentation types. The above method may further comprise the step of associating in the database a plurality of color resolutions with a plurality of presentation types. The above method may further comprise the step of associating in the database a plurality of graphic file formats with a plurality of presentation types. The above method may further provide that the presentation type is received from a user via an input device.
The above method may further provide that the determining step further comprises the steps of presenting a suggested presentation type to a user via a display device, and receiving a response to the suggested presentation type from the user via an input device.
The above method may further provide that the receiving step further comprises the step of receiving a desired color resolution for the image. The above method may further provide that the receiving step further comprises the step of receiving a desired graphics file format for the image. The above method may further provide that the delivering step further comprises the step of assigning a title to the corresponding graphics file. The above method may further provide that the retrieving step further comprises the steps of generating the corresponding graphics file if the corresponding graphics file is not found in the database, and storing the generated corresponding graphics file in the database.
Further in accordance with the present invention, a method is provided for managing an image associated with a presentation, the method comprising the steps of accessing a presentation containing at least one image, selecting an image from the presentation for a new use, receiving a desired graphics resolution for the selected image from a user, retrieving from a database a graphics file corresponding to the selected image and having the desired graphics resolution, and delivering the graphics file to the user.
Further in accordance with the present invention, a method is provided for selecting at least one of audio and visual content files from a database, each content file having an associated quality level, the method comprising the steps of receiving an intended use for the content file, determining an optimum quality level based on the intended use, and retrieving at least one content file having the optimum quality level from the database.
The above method may further provide that the quality level includes a resolution. The above method may further provide that the quality level includes a color depth. The above method may further provide that the quality level includes a compression indicator. The above method may further provide that the quality level includes a sampling rate. The above method may further provide that the determining step further comprises the step of determining an appropriate file format based on the intended use. The above method may further provide the step of delivering the at least one corresponding content file to a user.
Further in accordance with the present invention, a method is provided for generating an electronic presentation comprising the steps of storing a plurality of images in a database, each image being stored in a plurality of different formats, selecting an image from the plurality of images in the database for use in a presentation, selecting an optimum format of the selected image for use in the presentation, linking the selected image used in the presentation with the corresponding image stored in the database, and storing the presentation.
Further in accordance with the present invention, a method is provided for managing digital files associated with a presentation having at least one of audio and visual content, the method comprising the steps of storing a first digital file containing the at least one content in a first quality level in a database, receiving a presentation type for the presentation, determining a second quality level for the at least one content based on the presentation type, and generating a second digital file in the second quality level from the first digital file.
Additional features and advantages of the invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon consideration of the following detailed description of the illustrated embodiments exemplifying the best mode of carrying out the invention as presently perceived.